


Emet

by MissjuliaMiriam



Category: Kane and Feels (Podcast)
Genre: Gen, Jewish Folklore - Freeform, Neighbourlyness, References to Drugs, Tea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-11-15 12:51:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18073742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissjuliaMiriam/pseuds/MissjuliaMiriam
Summary: Kane and Feels meet the neighbours.





	Emet

**Author's Note:**

> catch me being AGGRESSIVELY JEWISH in every fandom i join ever
> 
> this hasn't been proofread! it's 1am! but enjoy anyway!

Miriam Cohen moves in on a Sunday, though neither Lucifer Kane nor Brutus Feels is aware of it at the time. Or, rather, they are aware only of a great deal of thumping issuing from the flat above them, and beyond obligatory grumbling, they both dismiss it as the usual thumping of a person moving in. So, perhaps better to say that they are both in fact aware that Miriam Cohen moves in on a Sunday, but neither are at the time aware that it is Miriam Cohen doing the moving, nor how she will come to intersect with their lives.

In fact, it’s several weeks before either Lucifer or Brutus become aware of Miriam Cohen at all, and it happens like this: Lucifer is walking up the stairs to their floor, not paying very much attention at all on account of the junk mail he’s flipping through, when he bumps into a tall man coming down at the same time as he is going up. He looks up, sees chest where on most other people he’d see shoulder, and says, “I didn’t know you were going out, Feels.”

“Hm?” says the man.

Lucifer looks further up and finds that, indeed, he has bumped into a man of a height with his partner, but this man has a swarthy complexion, features like a Roman statue, and a somewhat silly cap with a picture of a duck on it. He certainly is not Brutus Feels, despite the improbability of two men of such dimensions living in the same building.

“Ah,” Lucifer says. “My apologies.”

“Not at all,” says the man. His accent is vaguely Middle Eastern, perhaps; Lucifer can’t quite place it. Then he steps around Lucifer and continues on down the stairs.

Lucifer stands there and watches the man go. Once he’s gone, surely out of earshot, Lucifer says to himself, “Beans.” Then he heads for his flat, to report this finding to Brutus, which he does by opening the door and shouting into the flat, “One of our neighbours is not a human, Feels!”

“What?” Feels calls back from the study. After a moment, he emerges, a cup of tea in hand. “Come again?”

“Our neighbour,” Lucifer says, and then closes the door, which perhaps he should have done first. “Not a human, I’m quite sure. He felt… off.”

“Off how? Off bad?” Brutus says. “Should we go…” He gestures vaguely with his teacup. “Do something?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea,” Lucifer admits. “Just off. Perhaps we should get ourselves invited over for tea.”

“The last time we did that, several people died,” Brutus reminds him, which is rude. “Do you even know which neighbour?”

“I assume the new one,” Lucifer says, pointing toward the ceiling. “I’ve met all the others and I’m quite sure they were all human last I checked. Also, none of them match your stature.”

“Are you telling me you think this fellow isn’t human because he’s as tall as I am? _I’m_ this tall, and I’m definitely a human,” Brutus says. Then he pauses. Then he says, “I am a human, yes?”

“Yes, yes. No, I think this fellow isn’t human because _reasons_ ,” Lucifer says, waving a hand. “I’m saying he must be our _new_ neighbour because he’s as tall as you are.”

“Hm,” Brutus says. He takes a sip of tea. “Well. We can certainly try getting invited over, but we might be better served to just bring him brownies. If he doesn’t… eat, or something, that’ll be a clue.”

“I can make brownies,” Lucifer says.

“No drugs,” Brutus advises, and then vanishes back into the study.

Lucifer sighs. “He does love to ruin my fun,” he says to himself, and then goes to check if they’ve got cocoa powder.

 

Two hours later, Lucifer has produced brownies (without drugs) and Brutus has finished reading his article about… something. Foucault? Maybe? Lucifer isn’t entirely sure. Regardless: he’s done reading, and they can go upstairs to 304 to find out about their mysterious new neighbour, who will hopefully not attempt to kill them or eat their souls or any such other unpleasantness. Lucifer collects his pan of brownies and Brutus collects himself, and they go out and down the hall and up the stairs, until they are standing in front of their neighbour’s door, with its brassy _304_ and, Lucifer notes, a mezuzah nailed to the doorframe, which had not, as far as he was aware, previously been there.

As Lucifer’s hands are full of brownies, Brutus takes the initiative to knock. There’s a pause, and then from inside a woman shouts “Coming!”

They exchange a glance, but that’s all they have time for before the door is swinging open to reveal a woman of average height and roundly curvy build, with a mass of curly black hair that surrounds her head like a halo of shining shadow. She has wide brown eyes partially obscured behind round-framed glasses, which she pushes up her nose as she looks at them.

“Hullo,” she says. “Can I help you?”

“Ah, good day,” says Lucifer. “We’re your downstairs neighbours, and had the thought we might come and welcome you to the building!”

“Oh.” She looks down at the pan of brownies. “Are those brownies?”

“Yes!” says Brutus.

“Huh,” she says. “Well, come on in, I’ve just boiled water for tea. You might as well have a cuppa and introduce yourselves.”

“How hospitable of you,” Lucifer says in his most ingratiating tone. He hands her the pan of brownies when she gestures for them.

“Sure, sure,” the woman says, then turns and walks into the flat. “Adam! We’ve got visitors!”

From elsewhere in their flat, the direction of what is, in Lucifer and Brutus’s place, the living room, a man calls back, “In the living room!”

“Mr. Tall Fellow, Mr. Brownies, my… partner is in the living room—I’m sure he’d be glad to meet you while I pour the tea,” says the woman. Then she vanishes around a corner into her kitchen. The layout of the flat does seem to be the same, and so Lucifer and Brutus find their way easily into the living room, where the immense man whom Lucifer had met on the stairs earlier is sitting on the couch. He’s got a book open in his lap which appears to be written in Hebrew.

 _The strange accent_ , Lucifer remembers. It does explain several things.

“Hello again,” says the man on the couch. “Come, sit. I’m Adam; I take it you met Miriam.”

“Yes,” says Lucifer. He and Brutus sit in a pair of armchair opposite the couch. “Very nice to meet you properly—our encounter on the stairs rather reminded me that we hadn’t yet come to welcome you and introduce ourselves.”

“I see,” says Adam.

There’s a long, awkward pause. Lucifer considers broaching the topic of the fact that Adam is Very Wrong, but he can’t even articulate what about the man it is that bothers him—he simply feels… hollow. After this long dealing with things from the Other Side, Lucifer is well attuned to the presence of strangeness, and Adam is certainly strange, but he doesn’t feel in any way malevolent, he’s not exhibiting any obvious signs of otherworldliness, and even if he were Lucifer would really rather not get into any fights. He normally depends, in fights, on Brutus’s ability to overwhelm their foes, but even he would likely be outmatched by this mountain of a man.

“You have a lovely home,” Brutus says, into the pause. “I hope you and your partner are settling in well.”

“Yes,” Adam says. “Thank you. She’s happy to be here.”

“And you as well, I take it?” Lucifer asks.

“Oh, yes, me as well. What makes her happy makes me happy,” Adam says, and sounds rather sincere about it. From the doorway to the living room, the woman—Miriam, apparently—laughs; Lucifer turns to see her there was a tea tray, which she sets on the coffee table before sitting on the couch next to Adam. She doesn’t take his hand, or even sit particularly close to him, but seems comfortable.

“He’s a softie,” Miriam says, smiling. “Well, this is Adam as I’m sure he said, and I’m Miriam Cohen. And you two are…?”

“Ah, Lucifer Kane, at your service,” Lucifer says.

“Brutus Feels,” Brutus says.

Miriam smiles brighter. “Some names you have! So, you two live below us?”

“Yes, yes,” Brutus says, leaning forward to retrieve a mug of tea. He makes small talk with Miriam while Lucifer studies Adam. Adam doesn’t seem to notice; he’s watching Brutus and Miriam by turns, observing their interaction.

Eventually, there’s a pause in the conversation, and Lucifer says, “So, Adam, where are you from? I apologize, but I simply cannot place your accent.”

“Israel,” Adam says. “In a way. In another way, I was born here.”

Miriam turns her still-bright smile on Lucifer and says, “I’m sorry he’s so opaque about these things.”

“Oh, no, that made perfect sense to me,” Lucifer says. It didn’t, but he doesn’t have to _say_ that.

Miriam laughs. “Well, good then. Can I get you gentlemen anything else?”

“No, I’m great, thank you,” says Brutus, and puts his empty teacup back on the tray. “Well, it was very nice to meet you, Ms. Cohen—can I help you tidy?”

“Oh, sure, if you’d like,” Miriam says, and accepts Brutus’s help in ferrying the tea tray back into the kitchen.

Lucifer takes the cue, turns to Adam, and says, “So, what exactly _are_ you?”

Adam gives him a slow, steady look. Piercing. “What are _you_ , Lucifer Kane? You bear a heavy name, though I think you are less treacherous than it implies. But not an innocent, either.”

Lucifer clenches his teeth. “I’m what I need to be to do my work,” he says. “Which is primarily ferreting out things like _you_ to protect innocents like _her_.”

“I see,” Adam says, and nods. “Then we can get along, I believe.”

Miriam and Brutus return to the room then, before Lucifer can say anything else, and Adam turns to look up at Miriam and says, “I believe these two can be trusted.”

“Oh?” she says, blinks at him, and then casts Lucifer a gimlet eye. “What on earth did you say to my partner, Mr. Kane?”

“Oh, the usual,” Lucifer says, rising to his feet. “You perhaps should be aware that Feels and I are paranormal investigators and I would say well-versed in things from Beyond. Admittedly I have no clue what manner of thing your partner is, but you should be aware, Ms. Cohen, that he is not human.”

She rolls her eyes at him. “Well, for goodness’s sake. You could have just come out and _said_ that.”

“Not many people take this sort of thing well,” Brutus says cautiously. His hands are out of his pockets, wary. “I’m sure you understand.”

“Oh, right, fine,” she says. “Well, no worries, he’s not any sort of… whatever you might think he is. He’s perfectly harmless.”

“I would not say so,” Adam says in an undertone, clearly directed toward Miriam.

“No, _you_ wouldn’t, but that’s because you’re a large overprotective idiot at the best of times.”

“It’s not idiotic to do my job.”

“Honestly, it’s _not_ —ach. I apologize,” Miriam says, breaking off from what seems like a well-rehearsed dispute to turn back to Lucifer and Brutus. “In any case, if you must know, Adam is a golem.”

As if to demonstrate, Adam sticks out his tongue. In small letters, almost like a tattoo, a Hebrew word is written on his tongue.

“Huh,” says Brutus.

“Fascinating,” says Lucifer.

“I made him,” says Miriam. “So you needn’t worry about it.”

“Right,” says Lucifer, not entirely sure that it is, but he doesn’t know much about Jewish folklore. He feels vaguely as if he recalls reading some sort of tale about Prague, in which the golem very much was worth worrying about, but Miriam seems very confident.

“Well,” says Brutus. “I do apologize for prying.”

“Not at all,” Miriam says graciously. “You said you’re paranormal investigators, right? Well, Adam and I are, to be quite fair, a bit paranormal; only right that you’d want to investigate.”

“Indeed,” says Lucifer, a bit faintly. “I think perhaps we will take our leave now, Ms. Cohen. Thank you again for your hospitality.”

“Welcome to the building,” Brutus adds. “Er, feel free to knock on our door if… anything paranormal that you _didn’t_ make happens.”

“Certainly,” Miriam says, shows them to the door, bids a series of further polite adieus, and then closes her door. Lucifer and Brutus stand in the hall for a moment, and then by tacit agreement go back downstairs.

Back in their flat, Lucifer considers the day he’s had for a moment, and then decides to roll a joint.

“I think I’ll go buy a book on kabbalah tomorrow,” Brutus says. He’s gone off to make tea, as he does.

“That does seem like a good idea, doesn’t it?” Lucifer says. Considering, after all, that apparently there is a golem living in 304.

**Author's Note:**

> fine me @flippingnazguls on Twitter and @motherfuckingnazgul on Tumblr, where i will probably be sobbing about K&F


End file.
